


Under the sun and beneath the snow

by UnproblematicMe



Series: After the End that never came (TV based series) [6]
Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-21
Updated: 2020-05-25
Packaged: 2021-03-01 23:20:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 21,101
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23855266
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/UnproblematicMe/pseuds/UnproblematicMe
Summary: Aziraphale and Crowley keep some secrets from each other and draw in Anathema and Newt. Are the witch and the witchfinder prepared for their supernatural friends’ scavenger hunt?
Relationships: Anathema Device/Newton Pulsifer, Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Series: After the End that never came (TV based series) [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1448824
Comments: 57
Kudos: 46





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Please note that this story is part of a series. While most of it probably can be understood (and hopefully enjoyed) separately, some details will leave you confused without knowing about certain events in the other parts.

It was hot. Way too hot. With a snap of his fingers Aziraphale had miracled her into clothing appropriate for the conditions. But Anathema still was a human. A human who grew up in America and by now was used to the ever balanced climate of Tadfield, England. A human who could not just will away any inconvenient reaction of her body. Like the reaction to walking through a goddamn desert!

“Water, dear?” asked Aziraphale, dressed like probably nobody should dress in a desert, in a white tunic, no shoes, no headgear. Must be nice being an angel. Why the hell was she even here?

But then she took the water offered to her and Aziraphale smiled. Oh, right!

*

It was a pleasant evening. Anathema and Aziraphale were lounging on the porch swing behind Jasemine Cottage, drinking and talking. Newt had left for a few days to visit his mother and Aziraphale was alone at the moment because Crowley had gone ‘wiling’ – whatever that meant. Upon hearing that she was “grass widowed”, too, the angel had suggested to spend some time together.

Aziraphale was pleasant to talk to. After 6000 years on this planet he still managed to find an honest interest in Anathema’s life, her upbringing, interests and current situation. Granted, she was the last descendant of Agnes Nutter which in itself was interesting to him, but Aziraphale gave her the feeling to be important to him as an individual. His interest was genuine and his words were warm. He was exactly the kind of older man her teenage self would have developed a crush on faster than her brain could have told her “he is gay, silly”.

After a while of talking, her curiosity won and she started questioning him about, well, everything. And Aziraphale obliged her.

He spoke about the people he met.

“Adam was a very nice man, but also very naïve!”

“Jakob? Granted, he was very strong but seriously what man doesn’t notice being married to the wrong bride after slaving for years for this woman?”

“I love him of course! Jesus was a very kind and intelligent man but very much in love with his own voice.”

“Oh, yes, Jeanne! What a woman! But stubborn like a donkey! A very tough and courageous donkey!”

Wide eyed Anathema listened to the angel’s adventures through history, smiling fondly at the adorable blush spreading on his cheeks whenever he mentioned Crowley.

“I managed to get some of them on higher ground but almost drowned myself. Crowley, well, Crawly back then, was the last thing I saw before I lost consciousness and the first thing when I regained it.”

“I was heartbroken to see the poor man up there! If not for Crowley, I would have drowned in sorrow.”

“How was I supposed to know oysters are an aphrodisiac?”

“Of course the Black Knight was him all along!”

He ranted about his superiors.

“And then she just stares at you! Doesn’t breathe, doesn’t say a word, doesn’t even blink! Sometimes I think they forgot to give Uriel’s corporation eye lids…”

“I had to erase the memories of all the attendees! Never took Michael to a funeral again, no matter how much of a saint the departed was.”

“Always itching for a fight! I would have hidden everything that could be used as a weapon. Unfortunately for Sandalphon that is every single item in the world!”

“And so I say ‘Well, Gabriel, that’s pretty redundant’. And you know what he says? ‘Well, thank you Aziraphale, it means a lot when it comes from you’! Good Lord…”

It was well past midnight, both their faces warm and red from the wine, when suddenly a serious expression spread across Aziraphale’s features.

“So,” he started slowly. “Agnes told you that God does not speak to anyone anymore?”

“Well, that was the impression Agnes got, yes,” Anathema answered carefully as not to upset the angel. “But you’d know more about that, wouldn’t you?”

Aziraphale smiled sadly and shook his head.

“Oh, She has not spoken to me in over 6000 years, dear,” he said. “But I assumed that was because She was upset with me personally. You know, the sword business.”

“Because you lied to her?”

“I didn’t really lie,” said Aziraphale defensively. “She asked where the sword was and I said ‘I put it down here somewhere’. And I did! I put it in Adam’s hands. I never said it was still in my possession.”

Anathema snorted.

“Wow, you’d make a good lawyer! And that was even before you spent millennia with a demon,” she giggled. “But seriously. This is God. He… She is omniscient, right? Deceiving isn’t going to work better than lying.”

“Right,” Aziraphale admitted sheepishly. “That’s why I thought She was punishing me with her silence. If not for Crowley I might have gone mad because he was the only one who talked to me.”

“What about the humans?”

“Well, yes, I love them and I love interacting with them,” Aziraphale clarified. “But in the end it was always… shallow. I always talked to them under false pretenses, you know? So to be precise: Crowley was the only one who knew who I was, _what_ I was and talked to me.”

Anathema nodded. At first it had seemed weird to her that an angel and demon were so close. But seeing them together was so heartwarming that all doubt had left her mind long ago.

“But…,” Aziraphale said after a while. “I still would like to talk to Her again.”

“You must miss Her.”

“Yes, this is true, but the main reason…” The angel hesitated but then took a deep breath. “It haunts me to think that She would have wanted the apocalypse to happen or worse that She just wouldn’t have cared if Earth was destroyed and humanity would have gone extinct.”

“Maybe She knew what would happen?” Anathema tried to comfort him. “Maybe She trusted in humanity – and in you and Crowley of course.”

“Maybe, but…” Aziraphale sighed. “I would do anything to talk to Her one last time, to ask Her myself.”

“I’m sorry, Aziraphale,” Anathema said, patting his hand. “But I told you everything Agnes told me about that.”

“I know,” Aziraphale nodded. “But she told _me_ more.”

“Huh?” For a moment Anathema was confused, wondering shortly if Aziraphale had met Agnes once and why he had not told her before. But then she remembered Agnes’ last visit. “The envelope, of course. Agnes told you how to talk to God?”

“Not directly…,” Aziraphale said.

Anathema snorted.

“Of course not,” she chuckled. “She can never say directly what she means.”

“It says ‘What was lost can be found again if you return to where it all began.’”

“Where it _all_ began?” Anathema repeated. “You don’t mean…?”

“I think that is exactly what it means,” Aziraphale said. “I think I need to return to Eden.”

Once again in Aziraphale’s company Anathema’s thoughts began to run wild. Of course by now she had understood that he was an angel, an immortal being that had seen it all. She had understood that a lot of stories and myths were true. But there was a difference between understanding it and _grasping_ it, embracing it as truth not just as mere knowledge.

Eden was a real place. Not just the setting of an age old legend about the origins of humanity. It really was out there somewhere, ground to walk on, air to breathe. And the man next to her had actually been there. She knew and still had trouble processing it.

“Will you go there?”

“I have to,” Aziraphale nodded.

“I thought it was locked?”

“I locked it. Humans can no longer enter, that’s right. But I should be able to.”

“I don’t know, Aziraphale. Wouldn’t it be dangerous? What if your former colleagues are around there?”

“I am sure the other angels aren’t there,” Aziraphale answered bitterly. “It is the cradle of Humanity, nothing they showed much care for.”

“Still, Aziraphale, I have a bad feeling about this.”

“If there is the slightest chance to talk to Her again, to understand what She expects of me, what She really wants… I need to try.”

“I understand you,” Anathema sighed. “I really do. My life was dominated by finding out what an ever-presented yet absent mother figure really wanted. That got me in a lot of trouble!”

“And still you did it again and again,” Aziraphale said with a sly smile.

“I…” Anathema shut her mouth. The angel had a point there. “Well, I guess, as a united force, you and Crowley can manage whatever awaits you there.”

“Oh no, dear! I cannot tell Crowley about it! After his temptation, Eden was secured against demons. He couldn’t accompany me and would never let me go without him.”

“What?” Anathema asked. “You will keep it from him? You really shouldn’t do that alone.”

“Oh, I absolutely agree, dear girl,” Aziraphale nodded enthusiastically. “That’s why I thought you…”

“No!”

“But…”

“Absolutely not!”

“It could be fun.”

“It could be deadly!”

“It will be interesting!”

“I… no!”

“You will be one of three humans to ever see this place.”

“I… you…”

Anathema bit her lip. It _did_ sound interesting. A place of legend, for her to explore with an angel by her side. But the risks could not be underestimated. No, it was too dangerous.

She turned around to tell Aziraphale just that and was met with a pair of wide blue eyes, a sweet smile and pleadingly raised brows.

*

Right! That angelic smile was what had gotten her into this situation. Aziraphale was looking around and after a while he nodded.

“Here we are,” he announced.

Anathema did not see anything. But she was not surprised. This was the desert. A huge garden would be visible from miles away if not hidden by supernatural powers. Out of curiosity she checked her phone. Of course she had no reception here, but she was relieved to see that her last message to Newt had been sent before she and Aziraphale had entered no-man’s land. Aziraphale did not want to tell anyone, but she had made a promise to Newt not long ago that she would never do something stupid again without at least letting him know. And she was sure this qualified as stupid.

*

On instinct Newt grabbed his keys to his mother’s apartment, but then halted. He reminded himself he no longer lived here and these were for emergencies only. With a little nostalgic smile, he put his keys back into his jeans’ pocket and rang the bell.

His phone hummed and he saw a message by Anathema.

_On a mission with Aziraphale in Eden. Should you come across Crowley, don’t tell him._

Newt frowned. Eden? Was that a sort of code? Or was his girlfriend actually on her way to the literal origin of humanity?

Confused he started mumbling to himself, “And why would I come across Cr…?”

The door opened and Newt put on a smile to greet his mother, but instead of Mrs Pulsifiers warm brown eyes a pair of golden snake eyes looked at him. A very familiar redhaired demon grinned cockily at him and pulled him into his mother’s apartment.

“Crowley? What is going on? Where is my mother?”

“On a cruise. She won it, lucky thing,” Crowley said casually. “She sent you a message so you know. You should answer by the way. Not that she gets worried.”

“What are you talking about? I didn’t get a message from my Mo…”

A pinging sound from out of his back pocket interrupted him. Sure enough the display showed his mother’s number and the words:

_Honey, you won’t believe it. I won a cruise! The only downside is, it starts tomorrow. We need to reschedule our mother-son weekend! In case you’re already on your way, make yourself at home in your old room. There is lasagna in the refrigerator and your favorite ice-cream in the fridge. Love you – Mom._

“It says here the message was sent yesterday.”

“Looks like you should have a word with your provider,” Crowley grinned.

“That was you,” Newt stated. “My mom winning the cruise and my phone getting the message delayed.”

“Smart boy,” Crowley said ironically. And when Newt stared at him with a sour expression, he held up his hands in a placating gesture. “Don’t be like that. I need your help. So I got your mother out of the way – with something she deeply wished for, by the way, you’re welcome – and made sure you get here anyway instead of staying with your little witch.”

“What?” Frustrated Newt threw his bag on the couch before throwing himself on the soft sofa. “I have a dead prophetess fiddling with my life and that of my future… my girlfriend. I do not need an egocentric demon to manipulate me and send my mother over the sea!”

“Ohh, someone’s touchy,” Crowley mocked. “Don’t worry. It won’t take long. While your mother is having the time of her life on a magically protected ship, you’ll help me with a tiny problem. We’ll be back before you know it so you can eat that lasagna or go back to book girl.”

“Her name is Anathema. And back from where?”

“Back from where the tiny problem is of course,” Crowley said. “There is this security system that is in my way…”

Newt heaved a sigh.

“Crowley, we know each other because of my part in preventing the apocalypse,” he said. “A part I could play because I am bad with computers. And security systems are usually not beaten by destroying the computer that runs them. Doing that most likely leads to a complete shutdown and whatever you seek is even harder to get.”

“Wow, aren’t you an optimist,” Crowley chuckled. “But don’t sell yourself short, nerd boy. Anathema says you know the theory quite well AND that your… curse - or whatever it was – seems to wear off, now that it has fulfilled its purpose.”

Newt rolled his eyes. He did not like how quickly Anathema had become friendly with Crowley. Aziraphale, yes, he could understand. But a literal demon? Then again, he knew that Anathema told basically everyone about Newt’s skills and that was because she was proud of him and he had to admit that thought filled him with warmth.

The demon had another point: Computers were indeed less likely to break by his hands now. Lately he had been able to use his vast theoretical knowledge without causing any minor or mayor catastrophes in practice. But since Crowley probably would not ask to improve his PC’s performance, Newt was not prepared to test the theory of the disappearing curse with him.

“Come on, nerd boy,” Crowley purred and looked at him intensely. “You owe me. I helped you save your little witch.”

“I… guess you did, but…” Newt felt all his counterarguments run out of his mind and only Crowley’s very good points stayed. He owed him after all. And Newt _was_ very good with computers. And… What? No! “Stop that now! I will tell Aziraphale and Anathema when you keep using your powers on me!”

“Spoilsport,” Crowley grumbled, but then he begged: “Come on! I really need your help! Your girlfriend’s lovely ancestor is convinced that it is crucial…”

“Uggh,” Newt interrupted. “Of course, the old witch again. Should have known. Everybody is very keen on dancing to her tune.”

“You’re not a fan, huh?” Crowley said with an amused smirk. “What did your letter say?”

“I wouldn’t know,” Newt answered defiantly. “I didn’t open it. Agnes Nutter has been playing with me for long enough. Could have been my whole life for all I know.”

Crowley made a vague noise, but nodded.

“I get that this is an unpleasant thought,” the demon said untypically softly while sitting down next to Newt. “But maybe you’re killing the messenger here? She had the visions and wrote them down.”

“You know that’s not all she did,” Newt gave back. “Especially Anathema was ordered around by that stupid book all of her life.”

“As far as I heard she toned it down a lot now that the world is safe,” Crowley said. “And you cannot blame her for wanting to save everything. I sure don’t.”

“I know,” Newt sighed. “I get that there was a lot at stake, but shouldn’t we be free now?”

“But we are!” Crowley said. “We all are! It’s our decision. And I decided to listen to the witch who was right about fucking everything so far.”

“Well, I guess that is a valid way to look at it.”

“And maybe you could decide to help me out not as a believer in Agnes Nutter but as my friend.”

“Oh, we’re friends now?” Newt raised a brow.

Crowley put on an over-dramatic look of hurt for a second, but then he grinned.

“Alright. You could help me as a fellow member of ‘Team Armageddon’t’?”

“That’s a horrible name.”

“So you don’t want a t-shirt?” Crowley grinned before he got serious again. “Come on. This once. I really believe I have to do that to keep us safe. Us including my angel and your witch.”

For a moment Newt pondered the demon’s words. He was not wrong. Agnes’ prophecies always had been on point – often much to his dismay. And Crowley was very determined so Newt gave in.

“Alright,” he sighed.

“Great!”

Crowley jumped to his feet and before Newt could even react, the redhead pushed the living room table aside and lifted the carpet beneath. On the cheap wood of the floor someone – presumably Crowley – had drawn magical runes in a circle. Thanks to his girlfriend’s occupation he was no stranger to such things, but there was a difference between his smart, responsible Anathema handling those and impulsive, demonic Crowley doing so.

“What are you doing?” Newt asked with rising panic.

“Opening a portal to our destination.” The demon powered up the runes. Then he mumbled something and the syllables cut a rift in the fabric of the world. A strange glowing portal appeared in the middle of the circle.

“Which would be?”

“Small Wolf Island, Canada,” Crowley announced. “Famous for being the home of Winner Security, leading company in Security Technology.”

“Famous?” Newt repeated. “Never heard of the place or the company.”

“Hmm,” Crowley nodded. “That’s because Satan himself sealed the island and made sure everyone forgot about it. It’s basically a conclave of Hell now.”

“What?” Newt exclaimed, but he was already grabbed by the demon’s strong hand and pulled through the portal.


	2. Chapter 2

Aziraphale opened his arms wide and nodded. With a blink of his eyes, the air suddenly wavered. At first, Anathema thought it might have been an optical illusion caused by the heat and her own exhaustion. But then part of the vast sandy landscape and the clear blue sky just fell away, like a veil lifted by a vain architect to present his newest creation.

A large wall appeared in front of her eyes. It had the color of the sand surrounding them, and stretched out too far to see to both sides. Tips of greenery protruded the stone constructions, giving an idea of the rich fauna hidden in the garden.

Anathema was not sure how long she had been staring in awe at the huge secret hidden in the desert, but when she finally turned away, Aziraphale was smiling at her. He was visibly amused about her overwhelmed expression and she understood that he had been waiting for her to come to terms with what she saw.

“Shall we enter?” he asked. “Or do you need a moment?”

That was a hard question. She definitely wanted to enter _and_ definitely needed a moment. But her curiosity had always been a force to be reckoned with and so she nodded with a determined face.

“I’m ready,” she said. “Where is the entrance?”

“Oh, there isn’t really an entrance,” Aziraphale said. “Before Adam and Eve were cast out, there wasn’t really any need for a gate. We made a hole in the wall to get them out and I closed it when they had left.”

“That… is drastic,” Anathema said. “Anyway, how do we get in then?”

Instead of an answer, Aziraphale took a relaxed posture and closed his eyes. Behind him, emerging from his back, a pair of huge wings, snow white with a pearly shimmer at the tips, appeared. He stretched his arms out with a smile.

“May I help you up there, M’ lady?” he asked.

“O-okay” she said with a blush, stepped closer and allowed Aziraphale to scoop her up.

“Ready?” he asked, holding her up bridal style.

“You know that Crowley would kill me, if he saw that, right?” she asked.

“He is not _that_ jealous!”

“He is!”

“Well, yes. But he is not here.”

Anathema felt a rush of air when suddenly the huge white wings on Aziraphale’s back began to move. Soon the angel pushed himself of the ground. With more force than Anathema had expected, she and the angel lifted off the ground and flew up towards the cloudless sky. The ground beneath them receded as they emerged along the great wall.

Anathema’s squeals were of delight and yet she clung tightly to the angel.

“Are you alright, dear?”

“Yes!” she exclaimed. “That is amazing! Lois Lane, eat your heart out!” She laughed before adding: “Oh, Lois Lane was…”

“I own a shop for old, rare and valuable books, Miss Device,” Aziraphale admonished good-naturedly. “And you think I never held a ‘Superman’ comic in my hands?”

“Right, sorry.”

“Already forgiven.”

They landed on the Eastern Wall. Anathema knew the story of Crowley and Aziraphale meeting up here and therefor was not surprised about the fond nostalgic smile forming on the angel’s face.

“Take my hand, dear,” Aziraphale instructed. “I’m not sure how stable these walls are. Without divine maintenance time might have taken its toll on them.”

Anathema nodded and did as he asked. The construction looked stable and unfazed by its own age. But it was a long way down and why risk falling when she could hold on to someone with wings?

Aziraphale led her along the wall, the vast sea of sand stretching out towards the horizon to their right, the dark green tops of healthy large trees to their left. After a while they arrived at a long stone staircase that wound its way down into the garden. The angel tutted disapprovingly at the green vines that over time had grown over the steps, making it hard to walk on them.[1]

When his naked feet touched the soft grass of Eden, Aziraphale let out a sigh. He looked around, his eyes appearing to drink in every detail. But he did not let go of Anathema’s hand until she too had safe ground underneath her.

It was almost unreal how beautiful the place was. The meadow beneath her feet looked so perfect that Anathema could not help herself. She got rid of her walking shoes and socks to feel the soft grass on her skin, just like Aziraphale. A gentle breeze rushed over the meadow and through the verdant trees, caressing Anathema’s heated face and tussling her hair. The leaves rustled with the movement and mingled with the murmuring of a river in the distance. Sweet smells reached Anathema’s nose, all different but in perfect harmony with each other. Sight, hearing, smell and touch, four of her five senses tingled in the most pleasant way and yet something was wrong. Underneath the perfect picture Eden made, was a lingering sense of sadness. Grief. Loss. But also something else. She tried to reach deeper into the place’s energy but whatever that other feeling was, it escaped her.

Anathema looked at Aziraphale who met her eyes with a sad smile.

“You feel it, too, don’t you?” he asked.

“Yes,” she nodded. “This place is… mourning.”

“Indeed,” Aziraphale sighed. “After all this time. But it was a great loss, admittedly. From a home created, loved and guarded by God, to a forsaken place lost to man and history.”

“And that other… vibe?”

“Pardon me?”

“There seems to be another emotion,” she explained. “But I cannot grasp it. To be fair, I usually read people not plants, water or stone.”

“I’m not sure, dear,” Aziraphale frowned and closed his eyes, apparently focusing. “I can only feel the sadness. Oh, and some love. Probably memories of God’s love or the bond between Adam and Eve.”

“Strange.”

“Come on,” Aziraphale smiled and reached out to her again. “Let’s start our search at the apple tree. It definitely marks a beginning.”

Nodding Anathema accepted the hand he offered and returned his smile. For a moment, she felt watched and turned around but saw nothing. So she shrugged it off and followed Aziraphale.

Anathema was in a very unusual situation and thoroughly distracted. Otherwise she might have noticed that the humble daisies in the grass, the proud roses near the wall as well as the pretty lilies under the trees were no longer facing towards the sun.

*

The moment Newt appeared on the other side of the portal, he drew in a sharp breath and cursed. He was wearing a light sweater, a pair of jeans and sneakers. Not ideal standing in thick snow while more dancing flakes fell from the grey sky, adding to the thick white carpet. Newt felt his legs sink deeper into the cold mass, his thin shoes no match for it, his socks soaking wet soon, the moisture slowly but steadily wandering up the fabric of his jeans, too.

His head snapped towards Crowley and he shot the demon an angry look. At least Crowley was no better off himself. His ridiculously tight trousers and the thin black shirt did not help against the weather at all and his whole body shivered.

“Yeah, right,” he murmured with clacking teeth. “Knew I forgot something,”

He snapped his fingers, putting them both in more adequate clothing. Newt’s feet were suddenly warm and safe inside a pair of winter boots, his hands wrapped in quality gloves. He felt long underwear form around his freezing legs, a thick pair of thermal pants appear above them while a warm sweater and a heavy jacket warmed his upper body. Crowley was dressed the same[2] and grinned satisfied.

“Why didn’t you remind me, nerd boy?” he asked. “Aziraphale would have.”

“Number one, you basically assaulted me, I couldn’t exactly make plans. Number two, it is summer so even in Canada a blizzard is not that likely. And number three, why _isn’t_ Aziraphale with you?”

“Number one, get over it already. Number two, you’re right, but the island is kind of stuck on the day Satan ripped it out of reality which apparently was a winter’s day,” Crowley said. “Number three, I will not bring my angel to a piece of Hell on Earth and...”

“He wouldn’t have let you go alone,” Newt finished the sentence.

“What? Pfff…no. I can do whatever I want. I just didn’t want to upset him.”

“Because if you would have upset him, he would have made that face and you wouldn’t have had the heart to go.”

“Noooo, I… he… we don’t have time for this. Come on!”

With that the demon started trudging through the snow. Happily Newt followed him, satisfied to have wiped the smug grin out of the confident demon’s face for at least a moment.

They had landed in a narrow canyon between high walls of snow covered rocks with only one way to go. The question whether Crowley had purposefully chosen this spot or the fact they had not ended up _inside_ a rock was mere luck crossed Newt’s mind, but he pushed it aside. Crowley led him along the path, winding between the escarpments.

Newt was not used to physical exercise in any form. The rare occasions of “training” in the witchfinder army had been literal walks in the parks with Shadwell glaring at people who might be witches (everyone) and his own hobbies did not include any kind of sports. So soon he was breathing heavily and it became harder to lift his feet high enough to walk in the snow. If Crowley noticed, he did not comment on it. The demon kept walking, erringly and unfazed.

Clouds and snowfall made it hard to see the sun, but Newt estimated it to be around noon when finally the rock walls surrounding them came to an end and offered the view on a quaint valley. A small path down the hill, framed by dark green firs and pine trees, led towards a gathering of houses. There were maybe a dozen buildings, all small and made of simple wood but sturdy. The blanket of snow covering the idyllic landscape only added to the scenery’s beauty, making it seem even more cozy and romantic. To the east a large frozen lake stretched out towards a conifer wood with a handful of ice fishing huts. The place looked perfect, for a week or two of rest and escape or - for someone sick of the city’s hassle - to settle here forever.

But that was only what it looked like. Newt had no supernatural powers like Crowley, Aziraphale or Anathema and he was not half as intuitive or empathetic as Madame Tracy. And yet the hairs on his neck stood at attention as he took in the almost picturesque place. Underneath the timeless beauty of this place something was terribly wrong. Judging from Crowley’s posture, the demon agreed. He stood motionless, but Newt could see that his whole body was tense, his golden eyes flicked from side to side as if looking for threats.

“What happened to the people here?” Newt asked after realizing that no smoke emerged from any of the chimneys.

“Only employers of Winner security lived here,” Crowley explained. “When the company closed its gates in 1999, they left. Satan made sure that as soon as they set foot on the mainland, they forgot about this place, false memories replacing those of this island.”

“That is cruel, playing with people’s life like that.”

“You remember Satan, right?” Crowley asked sarcastically. “The huge, monstrous guy at the airbase? Are you surprised that he is cruel? Actually, he was in a good mood that day. At least he only messed with their brains but left them inside their heads.”

Newt swallowed.

“You’re not wrong, I suppose,” he said.

“Seldom am,” grinned Crowley. “Come on, let’s go.”

Newt nodded and followed Crowley down the hill. After a few steps, Newt noticed a large building emerging between the tops of evergreen trees westward. It did not really match with the architecture of the other houses and its industrial design and stale grey façade stuck out between the dark wood, the green leaves and the pure white snow like a sore thumb.

“This is ‘Winner Security’?”

“Hmmm, ugly, isn’t it?”

“What’s so interesting about it?”

“Not sure. Your great-great-great-great-great-grandmother in law, well, in law in spe, is convinced they have something I need,” Crowley answered. “’Beneath the place the Dark Lord made the world forget, protected by Master Winners machines, lies what you need to protect what you protected before.’”

“That woman cannot NOT be cryptic, can she?” Newt sighed.

“Ah, give the lady a break, nerdboy,” Crowley laughed. “Imagine living in the 17th century and having visions of technology of the 20th and 21st century. That can be confusing.”

“That does not explain all of her babbling. She loves to mess with people.”

“Well, _I_ certainly don’t blame her,” Crowley grinned, showing off his fangs. “Now cheer up and let’s have a little break.”

They had arrived at the settlement and Crowley walked towards the first house. He was about to snap his fingers – most likely to break into the building - when a sound had both men turn their heads. Someone seemed to be walking on snow but the steps were lighter and faster than their own had been. They waited, their bodies tense, as the noises continued, coming closer. After a while, beside one of the houses in the center of the settlement, a wolf came around the corner. Its dark fur stood starkly against the white snow and as its yellow eyes fell on Crowley and Newt, it tilted its head.

Newt relaxed. Crowley did not.

“Shit,” he hissed and started slowly walking backwards, until colliding with Newt. Then he tried to nudge Newt to move away as well.

“What are you waiting for?” he asked. “Let’s move slowly towards the wood and hope it doesn’t follow.”

“What’s your problem?” Newt was confused. “It’s a wolf. In a place called ‘Small Wolf Island’ that can’t be a surprise for you surely?”

“Well, certainly not a good one. Now let’s go.”

“We need a break, Crowley. The cabin is right there,” Newt pointed at the building only a few steps away. “It sure cannot break the door. Not that it would want to. Wolves are not too keen on attacking people, especially not two grown healthy men.”

“I would agree, nerd boy,” Crowley hissed annoyed. “If this was a wolf in a normal Canadian settlement. But this is a wolf on a cursed Canadian island that Satan himself wants to keep hidden.”

Frowning Newt tried to process Crowley’s words, but a low growl interrupted his thoughts. The wolf stepped further into the center of the hamlet. Newt was not sure, but it was quite possible that its eyes were glowing a little by now. Slowly but without hesitation the animal walked towards the two men. That was unusual and concerning enough for a lonely wolf. But the fact that with every step the black predator seemed to gain size, was outright disturbing. Crowley had started walking backwards in the direction of the trees again, Newt now too happily following his example.

When they were only a few steps away from the edge of the woods, the wolf let out a bloodcurdling howl. Newt froze at the unearthly sound coming from the beast’s throat. He watched in horror as the wolf lifted itself to its full height by standing on its hind legs. The structure of the body changed. Not only did it grow even more in size, the legs became sturdier, the claws longer, the front part of the body broader. The beautiful shiny black coat transformed into a mass of fiery red fur, emerging from the muscular body like flames. The beast fell back to all four, but by now still stood taller as Crowley and Newt. The yellow eyes glowed and it growled at the men. Then it charged.

Newt felt how a strong hand grabbed his arm and pulled him away. Confused he stumbled through the woods behind Crowley. Trees and bushes flew by next to him, the wind whipped cold flakes of snow into his face and the ground crunched loudly beneath his feet. That he did not stumble or even fall appeared like a miracle and maybe it was one. Crowley – and therefor Newt who was pulled by him – ran at an inhuman pace but still the noises from the beast’s throat were too close for comfort.

“Where are we even running, Crowley?” Newt screamed over the rushing wind. “I’m sure it knows this place better than you!”

“We need to reach the Winner complex,” Crowley yelled back, without turning around. “It’s the only building around that at least has a chance to keep that thing out.

They kept running through the woods. Newt’s feet began too hurt under the pressure Crowley’s supernatural speed applied on them. But he knew that a normal human barely would have a chance outrunning the demonic predator that was on their heels.

The wood began to clear. Newt could see the grey building he had spotted from afar before. It was surrounded by a high chainlink-fence. Shortly Newt panicked, wondering if he would get up there fast enough, but then Crowley called out to him again.

“As soon as we’re there, I’ll give you a leg-up,” he shouted.

“Okay!”

When they left the last trees behind, Crowley slowed down.

“Okay, hurry!” he said. “Better get a few bruises by falling down the other side than…”

A noise that could have been a bark interrupted Crowley. To his horror Newt noticed that it did not come from the woods behind them but from somewhere nearby. He turned his head and sure enough spotted a dark wolf trot along the fence. It halted when it spotted Crowley and Newt and – too familiar – tilted its head. This one, too, did not hesitate to come closer.

When a loud howl echoed from the woods, the wolf’s ear’s twitched and it answered with a low growl. Still staring at the two men at the fence, the animal bared its teeth and came closer.

“That… can’t be good.”

[1] The plants took the angel‘s silent criticism and made some room, but not enough for Anathema and Aziraphale to walk side by side. Aziraphale was not amused.

[2] Even though he somehow managed to look cooler.


	3. Chapter 3

For a moment the wolf stared towards the woods, but then he turned to Crowley and Newt again. Or to be precise to Crowley. Now that only a few steps separated the two men from the animal, it was pretty obvious that his attention (and disdain) was directed at the demon.

The predator let out a loud howl. It was no less terrifying than the other’s, but in a different way. The first wolf’s cry had pierced right into Newt’s deepest fears, had awoken age old instincts to run and hide. Hearing this new sound touched his soul on a deep personal level. It stirred up insecurities he had harbored since his earliest childhood, made him feel small and insignificant, made him think that there was no use to anything he did at all and urged him to just give up.

Newt felt like all his energy was sucked from him, leaving him empty in body and soul. Only faintly he was aware that he sank to his knees in defeat.

“What the Hell?” Crowley muttered, clutching his chest. The demon was definitely more affected than he was by the first wolf. But Newt had not the strength to care about this or about anything.

Something blinded him. He turned towards it and saw that the wolf was engulfed in a bright blue light. It flared up and faded. When it was gone, the animal stood changed.

It did not look at all like the other one after its transformation. It had grown as well and looked strong but was leaner with longer hind legs. Instead of standing up in messy dark red stains, the fur had taken a beige tone with a golden shimmer to it and lay neatly against the body. The eyes were of a shining blue, fixed on Crowley. It would have been beautiful if not for the pure devastation it had caused in Newt.

“Climb,” Crowley said lowly.

“What?”

“Start getting up the fence. It has no interest in you. I’ll distract it.”

“Distract it? And then what? It’s no use.”

“Damn, nerd boy, just do what I say.”

“Why? Even if I get up there, what’s the point?”

“Shit,” Crowley cursed and then – never taking his eyes of the creature – very softly, almost friendly spoke: “Newton, I need you to think of Anathema. She loves you.”

“Does she?” Newt asked and became painfully aware that he was not sure about the answer.

“Of course, you idi… Of course she does. And your mom, too! There are people who need you, you ARE important. Don’t listen to whatever is going on in your head right now, please.”

Somewhere in the back of his mind Newt registered Crowley’s words, but they rang so hollow. Newt really tried. Tried to grasp Crowley’s word and hold tight, but it was like clinging to a lifebuoy when caught in a tsunami. Like listening to a faint song of encouragement against a thunderstorm of burning self-doubt.

There was no point in this, was there? A spark of curiosity was left that wanted to know how long Crowley would keep up the charade and pretend that ANY of this had value. But that spark was not enough to get any of his limbs to move.

“Damn it,” he heard Crowley hissing before he was grabbed, pulled to his feet and dragged away. Once more he was running after Crowley. Newt should have been impressed by the demon’s display of strength and speed and scared of the predator’s sounds behind them, but… nothing. He did not care. Vaguely he was aware that he and Crowley were rushing along the fence so it came to no surprise that – when Crowley abruptly came to halt – Newt fell against it, some loose chainlinks piercing into his back.

“Oh, shit,” Crowley said.

Newt followed Crowley’s gaze and saw the red wolf step out between a bunch of trees while he heard the golden one’s breath and steps from the other side. Looking between the creatures, Newt saw that they had stopped, staring at each other, then at Crowley and Newt, then at each other again.

“See?” Newt told Crowley. “I said it’s no use.”

“Damn, they got you good, didn’t they?” Crowley deadpanned as he pressed Newt against the fence with his own body’s weight.

Out of a morbid curiosity Newt turned his head from side to side to watch both wolves. Their initial surprise of seeing each other seemed to have worn off and they lowered their heads, growling. Their bodies tensed and their limbs twitched in excitement.

They charged.

Sighing Newt let his head fall against the fence behind him. The metal clanked in protest while he breathed out noisily. He awaited teeth and claws digging into his flesh, ripping him apart. Any moment now.

The creatures’ heavy breaths came closer, grew louder and culminated in a duet of angry snarls as they reached Crowley and Newt. But they did not touch the men. They found each other. Fangs and claws digging into the other’s flesh, they both ignored Crowley and Newt.

“Come on!” Newt heard Crowley say.

Shortly after his hips were grabbed and he was lifted into the air. Yelping he started to wiggle in the demon’s grip.

“Stop that and get over there!” Crowley hissed.

With that Crowley basically threw Newt up the fence and he had no choice but grab the upper wires or fall back down into the snow. It was more the instinct than the will to survive that had him hold on to the fence and pull himself up. Falling down on the other side, he could see Crowley cat-like climb along the chainlinks as well. Soon after the demon was beside him and pulled him towards the building.

Both men let themselves fall against the wall. Crowley out of exhaustion, Newt because he could not be bothered to stand.

“Okay, nerd-boy,” Crowley said after a while between labored breaths. “I need you to snap out of it now. It really got to you, hm?”

“Sorry,” Newt said. “Not used to demonic wolves.”

“Oh no,” Crowley laughed without humor. “That second one was not demonic. That one was an ethereal creature.”

“What? How?”

“I don’t know how. But I know what I felt. I know what I feel around this building. This areal here reeks of Heaven. And what it did to you is pretty telling, too.”

“What do you mean?”

“Let me guess. You feel worthless, therefor think everything you do is worthless and nothing has any meaning anymore.”

“Pretty much.”

“That’s Heaven,” Crowley said. “Hell will go low: It will stir up trouble with your instincts – fear, anger, lust. Heaven will go high: Into your thoughts, find your individual insecurities, doubts and concerns – and then go low.”

“I thought Heaven would be friendlier,” Newt said tonelessly.

“Not every Heavenly creature is like Aziraphale.” Crowley’s voice softened while he spoke about the angel. “And the wolf in particular seemed instinct driven. That’s probably why he attacked his demonic counterpart not us. Doesn’t mean it will take kindly to us if it sees us again.”

“I guess…”

“Dammit, Newton!” Crowley exclaimed impatiently, but then he sighed. “Let’s get inside. Whatever is going on here, the answer is probably in there. And I really don’t want to deal with the winner of the wolf battle.”

Part of Newt felt bad as Crowley pulled him to his feet once more and dragged him towards the entrance. But whatever the creature had done to him, still had a devastating effect on him.

“Winner Security” was large, but only compared to the other structures on the island. For “the world’s leading security company” it was not very impressive. A simple three-store flat-roof-building windows in the middle of nowhere was not exactly prestigious.

Reading his expression correctly, Crowley explained: “This was not their main office. More of a secret facility. The headquarters were on the mainland. It’s a Starbuck’s now.”

“Of course it is,” Newt said apathetically.

Crowley sighed. He cursed as the door refused to open with a snap of his fingers and again when he noticed that the security panel had no power.

*

Anathema barely dared to blink, not wanting to miss a single millisecond of walking through the garden. She had doused her supernatural senses a bit so that the overwhelming feeling of sadness did not drive her into a depression. Now she could fully enjoy the beauty surrounding her.

Aziraphale’s memory apparently did not fail him. He found his way between the verdant trees, along the lovely bushes and pretty flowers without hesitation. Finally they stepped on a small meadow, surrounded by rose bushes and some flowers even Anathema could not name. She spotted a cascade behind the greenery, its waters clear and lively. But most intriguing of course was the beautiful apple tree in the center of the meadow.

“That…,” she whispered. “That’s it? The apple tree?”

Aziraphale nodded with a wistful smile.

“Yes, beautiful, isn’t it?” he said. “And the fruits still look so delicious. I really can’t blame Eve.” He sighed. “I should have seen it coming, you know. When God told them not to eat from this tree, Adam wore his usual ‘of course, whatever you say, Lord’ face. But Eve stole hidden glances at the apples from the moment the tree was put there.”

“I suppose pregnancy didn’t help with the craving,” Anathema joked.

Aziraphale giggled.

“Maybe I should have brought that up in her defense,” he said. Then he fell silent.

Anathema noticed the nervous fiddling of his fingers while he looked around, apparently unsure what to do next.

“Aziraphale?”

“I… don’t know how to start,” he admitted. “If She is really here somewhere… Why didn’t She make her self known? Maybe She doesn’t want to talk to me?”

“Or She is waiting for you to do something? I mean, She is omnipotent and omnipresent. She could have talked to you from anywhere or She could have stopped you from coming here. But Agnes is convinced you needed to come here. So maybe you need to be the one to take initiative.”

“Oh, walking through a desert is not initiative enough, then?” Aziraphale said primly, making Anathema smile.

“You’re stalling, Aziraphale,” she said.

“I am,” he admitted with a sigh.

Hesitantly he stepped closer to the tree until the shadows of the outer branches fell on his face. He turned his head eastwards and looked into the sky.

“Hello?” he asked carefully. “Lord? Erm, mother? Are you there?”

There was no answer, but Aziraphale’s face took on a confident almost stubborn expression.

“I’m not here to ask your forgiveness,” he said. “In fact, I don’t even know if you are angry with me. But even if you were, I wouldn’t apologize. I did the right thing. I did the right thing more often than I give myself credit for. When I gave my sword, when I helped the helpless even though Gabriel and the others thought it was a waste of miracles, when I helped save the world and… when I decided to be on and by Crowley’s side.”

He spoke firmly and self-assured, even a bit defiant. No longer was he wringing his hands or letting his eyes wander around nervously. But his voice lowered a bit as he continued.

“It’s just… I want to know: Did you want them all to die? Did you want the Archangels and the Dark Council to succeed?” He waited for a moment. “Mother?” A pause. “Are you here?” Another pause. “Do you care?”

His voice broke a little at that final question and he fell silent. He waited and listened, but there was nothing but the soughing wind and the gushing waterfall. Sighing he leant against the apple tree and slowly slid down the thick trunk until his butt landed in the grass.

Anathema crossed the meadow to kneel beside him and put a comforting hand on his shoulder. Unfortunately beyond that gesture she could not think of anything helpful. What did you tell someone who had not talked to his mother for over 6ooo years, found hope to reunite with her, walked through a desert to achieve that and got his hopes destroyed?

“It’s alright, dear,” Aziraphale smiled sadly, reading her thoughts. “Crowley was right. She isn’t talking to any of us. Quite arrogant of me to think she will make an exception for me of all angels.”

“Hey, from all the angels I met, I would definitely prefer talking to you.”

“You only met Gabriel.”

“Well, yes, but…”

“It’s alright,” Aziraphale repeated. “I got my hopes up and wanted too much.”

“Anyway, I don’t believe Agnes sent you here for nothing,” Anathema insisted. “You said it yourself several times: God’s plans are ineffable. Maybe She…,” searching for the right words, Anathema gestured wildly and looked around frantically. She paused when her eyes fell on something beige stuck under one of the tree’s roots, “…left a note?”

She let go of Aziraphale and robbed towards the thick vine of wood, sprouting out of the ground. Carefully she took the small scroll, lying under the root, between her fingers and tried to pull it out, but it did not move. Looking closer, she saw that it was not only stuck firmly between ground and wood, like it had been there before the tree had been planted, even the grass had wound itself around it.

“This has been here for some time,” she murmured.

Anathema put her hand flat on the ground, focusing on the grass around the parchment, on the single culms as well as on the unit securing the scroll. Letting her magic flow into the ground, she reached into the roots and changed the growth direction of the single blades. The grass stalks unfurled, freeing the scroll. The tree’s root was too stubborn and did not move, but without the grass there was enough room to pull the parchment out.

Aziraphale, whose curious gaze she had felt in her back, sat up as she proudly held up her loot.

“What is that doing there?” he asked.

“Well, I wouldn’t know,” Anathema smiled. “But it is a note ‘found where it all began’.”

Aziraphale’s eyes widened and his expression brightened.

“It is,” he said excitedly. “Maybe…”

Very delicately he took the scroll from Anathema’s hand and skillfully unrolled it.

“I’ve never seen parchment like this,” Anathema said. “On first sight it’s not unusual, but it is much softer to the touch and there is a faint shimmer to it.”

“Yes, we used this in the Heavenly archives and the library,” Aziraphale said. “I haven’t seen one of those in centuries. Neither have I read this language lately. But it seems to be a recipe? Or it could be a spell or a ritual.”

“Can you translate it?”

“I should be able to.” Aziraphale nodded. “I recognize some of it, but in my bookshop I have everything I need to decipher the whole text.”

“See?” Anathema smiled. “We will not leave empty handed.”

She got to her feet and this time it was her to offer her hand and Aziraphale took it.

“We have some time before Crowley returns,” Aziraphale said after putting the scroll into the small bag that was suddenly slung around his shoulders. “Do you want to take a last stroll?”

“That would be lovely.”

They went back to leave the meadow and Aziraphale almost ran into a weave of ivy ranks as he wanted to pass through between two trees.

“Oh,” he said surprised. “I don’t remember that being here. Strange.” He turned around, cast Anathema a confused smile and wanted to go back. “Let’s just…ahhh.”

As he stepped forward, Aziraphale was pulled off his feet and fell. Sprawled on the ground he looked behind himself.

“What?”

He and Anathema stared at Aziraphale’s ankles. One of the ivy vines had wrapped itself around the pale joint without the angel noticing and caused his fall. Before he or Anathema could react, several other of the vines shot out, slung themselves around Aziraphale’s upper body and pulled him back.

“Aziraphale!” Anathema exclaimed and tried to grab her friend’s hand.

But it was too late. With a surprised yelp Aziraphale disappeared in the thick braid of greenery. Anathema wanted to follow, but more climbing plants suddenly appeared and blocked her path.


	4. Chapter 4

Newt stared at the panel. Crowley had told him to wait and so he did. It was not like he had something else to do at the moment. It had been a while since the demon had climbed along the drain to wiggle through a broken window on the upper level.

At the other side of the fence the ethereal wolf had forced the demonic wolf to retreat and was now prowling outside. Apparently he had not spotted Newt yet, else he probably would try to get to him and it would not be too hard for the huge creature to either get over the fence – or just shred it to tiny scrapes of metal.

The upside of Newt’s current predicament was his absolute calmness at the prospect of a violent death by the claws of a supernaturally mutated wolf. Was mutation the right word here? Transformation? Who cared?

He tried what Crowley had told him. Think of his mother. Mother who had all her life suffered having a son incapable of touching anything electronic without destroying it, incapable of keeping a job. No wonder she had taken the chance to go on a cruise instead of letting him live of her again – even if only for a weekend.

And of course Anathema.

“She loves you,” Crowley had said.

What did demons know about love? What did Newt know about it? Or Anathema for that matter? Until they met, she had been chasing after Agnes Nutter’s prophecies, trying to find out what the old witch meant by her cryptic words. There had been no time for relationships with friends let alone lovers. And Newt himself had always been too shy, too awkward, too much Newt for things like that. Just like her, he had gone by theoretical knowledge alone on their first encounter. But unlike her, he had done it because he wanted to. Of course he had not loved her back then, they had known each other for an hour or so. But he had thought he was going to die and she was smart, sassy and pretty, a good catch.

She had done this to fulfil a prophecy.

Despite his current lack of emotions, he remembered the feeling of horror upon learning that she had slept with him because she thought she was meant to. The feeling of guilt for having taken something she had only given because she felt obliged to. And the nagging feeling of doubt since she had called him her boyfriend. It had taken him only half a day to fall in love with her head over heels so he had pushed that feeling aside. But now that all other emotions were gone, this doubt was ever present and he became aware that the best thing in his life was a lie. Anathema had been coerced to be with him and now probably stuck around because it was the only glimpse of love she had ever known. She was not his to have and he was despicable for taking advantage of her.

Suddenly a buzzing sound caught his attention. He turned to see that several lights in and around the building had switched on and that the electronic security panel was glowing yellow. That was probably the part where he should try to hack it and break in. Somewhat listless he adjusted his glasses and inspected the device. He was not surprised to find the needed tools in the jacket Crowley had materialized around him and was about to screw open the panel when there was a clanking sound behind him.

The wolf – most likely alerted by the building being powered up – was hanging in the fence, slowly deforming the metal, pulling the wires towards the ground. Sighing Newt turned to the panel again. He had removed the lid when he heard the fence give in under the wolf’s weight. There was no way he could open the door without a security code before the wolf reached him. Not that it mattered.

He kept working, hearing the predator’s heavy steps on the snow covered ground, his puffing and wheezing breaths coming closer and closer. Now Newt could see the creature in the corner of his eye. It jumped.

Newt turned to face his doom. He saw the wolf with its maw wide open flying towards him. And then it was gone. A heavy metal door suddenly was between Newt and the monster, colliding hard with the animal’s skull. An almost earthly whine escaped its throat as it was thrown back and landed hard on the ground. Newt was grabbed by a strong hand and pulled into the building. Crowley maneuvered him into a sterile looking reception area and slammed the door shut. Soon loud scratches were audible, but for now they were safe.

In the timeless village it had not been so obvious, but here Newt really felt like Crowley had pulled him into the past. The walls were of a stained light grey, two lonely cheap plastic chairs near a small table spoke of rare visitors to this place and an ancient computer on the receptionist’s desk of the decades that had passed since the shut-down.

“Good thing there is an emergency handle from the inside,” Crowley said. “Let’s explore. I’d say we split up, but I better keep an eye on you.”

He winked with a grin, but Newt could only bring himself to shrug. Sighing, Crowley led him through a double leaf door into a large hall with several doors. Most of the adjacent rooms were workshops, tools and electronic parts lying around as if the people had just left for lunch. One door led to the stairwell, the way Crowley must have come from his entering point. Another one was locked. but Newt spotted stairs leading down through the security glass.

“I have the feeling we find what we are looking for down there,” Crowley said.

“Why did you bring me again?” Newt asked. “Can’t you just use your powers to open it?”

“I can in fact not,” Crowley answered. “But I expected some powerful security measures made by Beelzebub or Satan himself, not a place that is basically flooded with _Divine_ power.”

“Are you okay?”

“Yes, don’t worry,” Crowley waved it off. “Can’t say it feels pleasant, but I’ll live. I’m just a bit tired. I used a lot of power out there to get us away from the wolves. And in here I cannot really get anything back, you see?”

“Okay,” Newt said. “I guess, whatever opens or closes this door is controlled by a nearby computer. It won’t be the one at the reception of course.”

“On the upper levels were office rooms,” Crowley informed him. “Maybe we’ll find something there.”

“Lead the way.”

*

Anathema was running out of options. She had no weapon, her magic skills were not exactly confrontational and scratching and biting did not really impress the army of supernatural plants. She had smashed her water bottle to attack the vines and branches that held Aziraphale hostage with the shards, but it had taken about a millisecond for them to be knocked out of her hands.

So now she was back to pulling at the green and brown angel-nappers to free her friend, but he was dragged further into the thicket until finally the last glimpse on his white robe disappeared behind a verdant green wall. Anathema used her whole body’s weight to press against the plants and follow, but she was not strong enough. After some useless struggling, she suddenly felt a hard hit against her stomach. A thick vine of an unknown plant slammed against her body and threw her several steps backwards, away from Aziraphale.

The impact had taken her breath away and the rough landing had not made things better (even though the grass of Eden was still ridiculously soft) so she was forced to give her body a moment of rest. Groaning she scrambled to her knees after a while and tried to breathe the pain in her stomach away. The plants had not pursued her and made no move to do so now. In fact the clearing around the apple tree would look exactly as before if not for the thick tangle of vines that had appeared to capture Aziraphale.

Slowly and warily she approached the green prison. At first nothing happened, but when she was about two steps away from the interweaved vines, they started moving again. And not only the plants holding the angel did. All the nearby flora and fauna suddenly seemed to be aware of her presence. Twigs and branches reached out to her, the flowers turned towards her, some birds gathered on the branches of a nearby cherry tree and she heard rustling of other animals moving in the bushes. There was an overall threatening vibe from the whole garden. Quickly she took a step back and all calmed down.

“Aziraphale?” she called out.

“Yes, deary? Are you alright?” she heard somewhat muffled from behind the wall of tendrils.

With a relieved sigh Anathema shook her head.

“Am _I_ alright?” she called back. “I’m not the one captured by aggressive plants.”

“But you’re the one not immortal,” Aziraphale answered. “Though I must say, I really dislike being restrained like this – at least under these circumstances.”

Anathema decided not to inquire about the last part and instead asked: “Are you hurt?”

“No, just my pride.”

“Can you use a miracle?”

“I tried, but it doesn’t work. It seems that the vines absorb my power as soon as I release it. I think they like it.”

“Great! At least someone’s happy,” Anathema mumbled. Louder she said: “Okay, can you move at all? Do you see any opening?”

“No and no. I’m thoroughly wrapped up.”

“Alright. Stay calm. I will… think of something.”

Desperately Anathema tried to sort her thoughts. What could she do? Aziraphale did not appear to be in immediate danger, but assuming she had some time, what to do with? Even if she found a way out of the garden without the angel, she would be stuck in the desert with no way of getting help.

She was Aziraphale’s only chance and she would save him or die trying. She avoided thinking about what was more likely. Damn! All that trouble for an old scroll.

The scroll! She remembered how she had used her powers to unwind the grass that had coiled around the parchment. Sure, the vines were larger and apparently more stubborn, but the spell’s concept would fit. But first she would try to read the garden once more to maybe find out what had caused the sudden attack.

Carefully, as not to upset the local flora again, she sat down on the ground. For a while she just stayed there and breathed before she allowed her magic to flow fully again. She lowered her hands, letting them rest beside her, softly touching the grass, closed her eyes and focused.

The moment she had reached the garden on a spiritual level, she gasped. This was not the same garden as only an hour before. That garden had been in a state of quiet grief. Now there was movement, everything was shifting. Excitement, hope, relief and love rushed through Eden like a river of gold washing away the dark grey stains of sadness. Confused Anathema went deeper, trying to find the source of that lively tidal wave of happiness flowing through the formerly mourning garden. Her eyes snapped open as she found it.

Aziraphale.

The garden’s soul was filled with Aziraphale. All living things here were set on him. A part of the long lost Divinity had returned to Eden and Eden was not willing to let it go ever again.

*

They found the computer in question in the office of Security Chief Wayne Schlegl. Maybe it would have been hard to access the administrator’s computer, had Mr. Schlegl not stuck a post-it with the password (DisneyPrincess123) under his desk.

But accessing the program that would open the door downstairs was harder than Newt had anticipated. He just could not focus. Whenever he had an idea, he would be gripped by a wave of hopelessness, he could not bring himself to follow his thought and finally it would slip away. Everything seemed so pointless and meaningless that he just could not find the motivation to use the vast knowledge he had.

After a while Crowley sighing got up from his chair.

“I’ll check the rest of the building. Maybe I’ll find something useful.”

Great. Newt felt some of his emotions return. Shame and guilt.

He, too, left his spot to stretch his legs. As he got up, his eyes fell on his thick jacket he had hung over the chair’s back. A familiar letter peeked out of the inner pocket and Newt frowned. Apparently Crowley’s clothing miracle had transported his old jacket’s content to the new one. Newt scoffed. Stubborn piece of paper, just like its writer. Maybe he should have burnt it after all.

“She promised only to intervene from now on when it is really needed,” Anathema had told him when she had handed him Agnes Nutter’s letter, bearing his name.

“Yeah, well, I _don’t_ need it,” he had answered and stuffed the thing into his jacket. “I’m fine.”

And it was true. On that day he had been fine. He had been with Anathema, he had proven himself useful, had saved her and for once had not felt completely undeserving of her love. But now? He was definitely not fine.

Hesitantly he reached for the letter. Several times he turned the envelope in his hand before finally ripping it open. He pulled out the sheet and unfolded it.

He recognized Agnes Nutter’s handwriting immediately and rolled his eyes upon reading the first line:

_Took you long enough, Witchfinder Pulsifier._


	5. Chapter 5

_Took you long enough, Witchfinder Pulsifier._

Newt rolled his eyes.

_I knew of course it would take so long._

Newt groaned annoyed.

_And now you are miffed because I knew._

Newt was about to crumble the letter into a ball, but his eyes fell on the next sentence.

_Look who is feeling something again._

Grudgingly Newt admitted to himself that the old witch had a point. The irritation he felt actually ripped a welcome hole into the void of meaninglessness he was floating in. Sighing he decided to give Agnes Nutter a chance.

_Good boy!_

_You were attacked by powers that left you with self-doubt. And I am partially responsible that a common countermeasure does not work. I am sorry about that. I should not have written down what I wrote about you and Anathema. But I had my reasons and while they are no excuse, they might be of use to you now._

_I know you, Newton Pulsifier. I have seen you in several of my visions – as a boy and as a man. You are kind, intelligent and – if need be – very brave. You do not judge too quickly and you never kick someone who is already down. You are a good man._

_And I saw Anathema – as a girl and as a woman. Headstrong, clever, courageous and still sometimes doubting her own worth. In need of a friend, of someone who will accept her and support her – without letting the stubborn thing walk over them._

_I had no vision about you and Anathema. I just felt that you would be good for her. In hindsight it was a bad idea to disguise my own wishes as a prophecy and I apologize._

Newt scoffed and looked at the ceiling. “How is that supposed to make me feel better?” he asked before looking at the next words.

_Well, I am coming to that now, boy. Patience._

_As you know, Anathema lived her life after my book. She studied all my prophecies and was determined to follow all of them to the letter. All but one. The one about you and herself. From the moment she was old enough to understand what it meant, she let everyone know that she would not do that._

_Since her 14 th year of life she has been determined to let this prophecy be the one she would forsake. You have lived with her. You know how headstrong she is. And still meeting you had her old resolve crumble to dust. _

_I was wrong in trying to push. But I was right about you. She saw the man I saw and she liked him._

_Following the prophecy was not the reason to be with you. Being with you was the reason she followed the prophecy._

_Maybe you can forgive a silly old woman for choosing the wrong way to find happiness for her granddaughter. And maybe you cannot. Maybe holding a grudge against me, is what you need._

_But do not hold one against yourself. You did nothing wrong. She is with you because she wants to._

_I thank you for taking care of her._

_Best wishes_

_Agnes Nutter_

_P.S.: Now snap the Hell out of it and do your job. It’s important._

Newt let the letter sink to his lap and could not help the little smile forming on his face. Agnes Nutter was still not his favorite person in the world. But he believed her. What he knew of her – and that was a lot – she was not the type to easily admit to a mistake (a family trait as it seemed) so she sure would not say something like that if she was not convinced of it. And even if he hated to admit it, it did his soul some good that a woman as smart and strong as Agnes thought so highly of him.

Newt tried again what Crowley had told him. He thought about Anathema. About the days they spent together, talking, fooling around or just walking hand and hand in silence. About the nights spend in each other’s embrace, sometimes passionate, sometimes tender. Now that he knew that all this was real, that this was _rightfully_ his, it had so much more power than before.

Slowly but steadily the dark shadows that gripped his heart and clouded his mind, faded away. Carefully he folded the letter and put it back into his jacket. After taking a deep breath, he turned his attention back to the computer. He could think clearly again and had a reason to put this to use.

When half an hour later Crowley returned, patting dust out of his clothes and plucking cobwebs from his hair, grunting “Looked everywhere, found nothing”, Newt gave him a smug smile. He leant back in his chair and casually let his right index finger fall on the “Return” button. The computer made an affirmative pinging sound and a loud buzzing sound echoed through the building.

Immediately Crowley’s face lit up.

“Knew you had it in you, nerd boy,” he said.

“Well, I didn’t,” Newt answered self-ironically. “But I made it. Let’s hurry.”

The two men hurried down the stairs, returning to the great hall on the ground floor. Crowley’s grin broadened as he saw the green light next to the security door. When they stepped closer, a sensor beeped and the door slid open.

Crowley grabbed Newt, pulled him through the passage and steered the two of them towards the flight of steps. It was a simple stairwell, wide enough for two people walking side by side, the walls painted in the familiar light grey that was characteristic for the whole place.

The stairwell took only one turn and after passing it, Crowley groaned. Newt soon saw why. At the foot of the stairs was nothing but another solid security door.

“I got this,” he told the demon with his new found confidence and began working on the security panel. He managed to bypass the door’s security measures like he had never done anything else in his life. He heard the door slide open and with a proud smirk turned towards Crowley. But the demon did not look at him. He just stared into newly revealed area.

“That explains a lot,” he said.

Newt stepped beside him. Behind the door was a large circular area, completely empty, safe for the center. There, apparently held in the air by an invisible force, levitated a wooden staff. Its appearance was simple, but even Newt could feel that it was not simple. Even he, being an average human with no supernatural powers or senses, was aware of the pure Divinity radiating from the staff.

“Wow, that feels Holy,” he stated and turned to Crowley. “Are you okay?”

“What?” Crowley asked, apparently ripped out of deep thoughts. “Yeah, yeah, I’m fine. Not exactly a nice feeling, but I’m okay.”

“Is that the source of the Divine energy? That you felt around the building? What transformed the wolf?”

Crowley nodded.

“And the reason, Hell abandoned this place. The idiots probably thought they could handle it. But it got too much, they tried to contain it and finally jumped ship… or island.”

“What is it?” Newt asked.

Crowley stepped closer to the room’s center, starting to circle the wooden weapon.

“That is the staff of the Archangel Raphael,” he answered. “He… lost it shortly after the rebellion in Heaven.”

“Ah, okay,” Newt said. He was a bit concerned as he watched Crowley staring at the staff so mesmerized. “Archangel, huh? Sounds… powerful. You sure you should get so close? I mean the thing is apparently so holy that it drove Satan himself from this island.”

“I’m gonna be fine, nerd boy,” Crowley said before reaching for the staff.

Whatever magic held the weapon in place, sizzled around Crowley’s hand and arm as he passed it by, but soon the effect faded out and the staff fell into Crowley’s open palm. He grabbed it. For a moment the weapon shook visible in his hold, judging from Crowley’s expression causing him some pain. But suddenly it stilled, vibrated once more and then remained in Crowley’s grasp, unmoving.

When Crowley returned to him, Newt felt even more of the power lying in the staff.

“Okay,” he said. “I’ll admit that might be helpful to ‘protect what you protected before’. Anything else from here you might need to save the world again?”

“Absolutely not,” Crowley hissed. “While you were having your crisis, I searched every corner of this dull place. So unless the next Armageddon is too be stopped with rusty tools or expired chocolate bars, we are good with that.”

Skillfully he whirled the staff in his hand and grinned. Newt found it weird to see a demon handling an angel’s weapon, but then again, this demon dated an angel. Maybe he had gotten used to having a certain amount of Holiness touching him.

*

Anathema had done her best to evaluate the situation. Aziraphale was caught in a net of plants that had formed between a group of trees. There were four points of entry to approach said net – in theory. As soon as she came nearer than about two steps, the whole garden seemed inclined to attack her. It was obvious that there was no intent to harm Aziraphale. Quite the opposite. Judging from what she had read in the garden’s collective mind, wrapping Aziraphale up was equally to prevent him from leaving and to keep him safe. According to Aziraphale himself, he could neither move nor use his powers, but was in no pain and could breathe properly. That was something.

Aziraphale had all the time in the world of course, but Anathema had not. There was enough food and water, but settling down here until she died of old age was not an attractive option.

She thought of the message she had sent to Newt. He would know where she was once he had understood that she had meant literal Eden. But then what? Even with Newt by her side she could not fight a semi-conscious garden. And she had told Newt not to tell Crowley. The demon could not enter Eden anyway since the walls were protected against his kind.

What could she do? She tried to think of anything, went through all the spells she knew in her head. But nothing helpful came to mind. And just when she thought things could not get any worse, she suddenly felt dizzy. Her vision blurred and she started to sway. Feeling a bit nauseous, she groaned and grabbed her forehead.

She heard Aziraphale’s worried voice. The angel must have heard her sounds of discomfort. But she could not answer him at the moment since she was busy with the attempt to stay on her feet. Unfortunately the attempt failed.

*

Carefully Crowley opened the front door and peeked out before signaling Newt to follow him out of the building. The Ethereal wolf was not in sight and it came to no surprise that his Demonic counterpart was not either. Uncharacteristically for Newt he was grabbing Crowley’s left arm while the demon held the weapon in front of them with his right hand. And uncharacteristically for Crowley he allowed it.

They made their way towards the destroyed fence, both listening carefully for any sounds besides the wind and crunching of snow beneath their feet. Finally they left the grounds of Winner Security behind and entered the woods. Here Crowley let himself fall against a tree and breathed out in relief.

“Ahh, that’s better,” he said. “Let’s get to the cabins. A few minutes of rest in demonic territory and I should be able to get us out of here.”

“Why does the Heavenly ‘infected’ territory influence your powers and cause you discomfort, but holding the source of the energy is no problem?” Newt wanted to know when Crowley pushed himself off the tree and continued walking towards the settlement.

“What radiated from the weapon and seeped into the area is pure Divine energy,” Crowley explained. “Contained in the weapon it’s… different.”

“Yes, but it apparently doesn’t really stay in the weapon, does it?” Newt asked.

“It does now.”

“What? Why? What’s different now?”

“It is no longer imprisoned,” Crowley said.

“It contaminated the area with Holiness because it didn’t like being locked up?”

“Yes,” Crowley nodded. “It was… calling out.”

“To whom?”

“Just… someone.”

“Crowley, I’m getting the feeling you’re withholding information that might be…”

A scrunching noise sounded behind them. Newt swung around, expecting to see a giant wolf walking across the snow. He frowned in confusion since he saw nothing coming towards them. When he heard it again, his gaze wandered towards the ground.

His eyes widened as the snow-covered earth before him cracked open and slowly yet way too fast a shock of ash-blonde hair appeared.

“Shit!” Crowley cursed and grabbed Newt by the arm.

He started pulling him in the direction of the cabins again, but stopped dead in his tracks when the ground in front of them crumbled away as well. To their left and right they saw similar pictures. They positioned themselves back to back and Newt watched in horror as in front of him the figure of a woman appeared. She was lithe, had long blond hair and was very pretty, but still he felt like screaming since everything about her was wrong. In the corner of his eye, he saw to other figures moving and assumed that one more was facing Crowley.

“Isn’t that interesting?”

At the voice Newt’s head snapped to his left. Now that he saw the man fully, he immediately recognized Duke Hastur and of course so did Crowley.

“What do you want?” Crowley asked, impressively calm and confident. Had Newt not known he was weakened, he wouldn’t have guessed.

“Oh, up until a few seconds ago I just wanted to fulfil my task for Beelzebub and check what was going on with the power fluctuations on Small Wolf island,” Hastur said conversationally while lighting himself a cigarette. He took a few swigs before speaking with a darkened mien: “Now however I want to kill a traitor who killed my… colleague and the man of that whore that humiliated me in front of my men.”

“Watch your tongue!” Newt snapped at Hastur before he could stop himself. But even after realizing that threatening or provoking the demon would not get him anywhere, he could not get himself to regret it.

“Or what?” Hastur sneered and stepped towards Newt.

Newt stood his ground, but focusing on Hastur, he knew that there were at least two other demons in his back.

“Or that!” Crowley suddenly snarled, pushed Newt to the ground and swung the staff they had taken from the facility.

Hastur had not expected it and the wooden staff collected hard – and noisy – with his right temple. From what Newt knew by now about demons a hit like that should hurt, but normally cause no great damage. Hastur however wailed in pain when his head connected with the wood. Screaming he pressed his hands against the injured spot and stumbled backwards.

Normally in a situation like that, Newt should be terrified to lie helpless on the ground, but there was no need for fear anymore.

While Hastur was howling, the other three demons stood frozen, only exchanging confused glances. Until their leader finally removed his hands for his wounded head. The demons and Newt gasped as they saw the scorched skin peeling off from the duke’s face, some fiery sparks still glowing in the blackened flesh.

It was just now that Hastur really paid attention to the weapon in Crowley’s hand.

“You… took it,” he gasped.

“Observant as ever,” Crowley said darkly.

“How can you…? Why does it not…?”

“Does it matter?”

Hastur’s face hardened again.

“No, not really,” he said. “You got yourself a fancy weapon. It’s still four against one.”

“Hastur,” Crowley said. “Do you really want to risk this fight? Look, I know how hard it must be for you what I did to Ligur, but it was self def…”

“You have NO idea what you did to Ligur!” Hastur’s voice boomed through the woods. “And I don’t want to hear your excuses. You always were good with words. Talked yourself into the good, well, the bad… the evil graces of the Dark Counsil. But when has that ever worked on me, Crowley?”

“I know, I’m asking a lot,” Crowley said, still very composed. “But don’t be an idiot.”

“Get him!” Hastur yelled.

The demons hesitated, staring at the staff Crowley was carrying. Hastur growled, threw his cigarette into the snow and lifted a hand, a black longsword materializing in it.

“Did you not hear me?” he shouted. “Get him!”

Thinking quickly, Newt rolled aside. Frantically he looked around to find anything to fight with, but the few fallen twigs between the trees were not nearly robust enough. Luckily for him, the demons paid him no mind. They all focused on Crowley, assuming him to be the bigger threat. And rightly so as Newt soon realized.

With ease and elegance (and an arrogant smirk) Crowley swirled the staff in his hands again, his confidence and skill adding to the enemies’ insecurity and fear. When the first two finally attacked, the weapons they had materialized were easily blocked by Crowley. Easily and with an impressive strength behind it that pushed the demons away from their target.

“Look out!” Newt called as he saw Hastur running up to Crowley from behind. But even before he had finished his warning, Crowley had already flung the weapon from his right into his left hand and – without even turning around – he swung it behind his back, hitting Hastur’s upper leg hard. Again the Duke cried out in pain and fell to his knees.

When her comrades had recovered from Crowley’s fierce riposte to their attack, the female demon joined the fight. But Crowley still kept the upper hand. Thanks to the range of his weapon he could keep the opponents at a distance and thanks to its nature cause them pain with every hit. At one point they were trying for a coordinated attack. But Crowley was too fast for them. With demonic speed he took the weapon in both his hands again, holding it horizontal against his upper body, this time throwing all three demons back when they attacked. But now he did not let up. He jumped after them and swung the staff against one male demon’s forehead and the other’s temple with enough force to knock them out. The remaining foe took one look at her unconscious colleagues and turned to run away. But again Crowley benefitted from his weapon’s length. Quickly he turned to her and attacked, hitting the back of her head, knocking her out as well.

Just in time for Hastur to recover from his pain, Crowley swung around to face him. Threateningly he stalked towards the Duke. Hastur retreated, trying to keep some dignity in his movements. But the injury at his leg took its toll and he fell backwards.

Newt scrambled to his feet, wondering if he was morally obligated to stop Crowley from killing Hastur outside of a situation with self-defense character. Unsure he stepped beside Crowley whose golden eyes were fixed on Hastur.

“How is that possible?” the Duke breathed out when Crowley pointed the weapon at him. “It should not obey you. Even if you are no longer a demon, if you really have gone native…”

“Well, it’s not the only Divine thing that likes obeying me,” Crowley quipped and winked at Newt.

Newt only groaned and hid his face in his hand.

“Not the time,” he whined, his palm muffling his voice. “Now that I think about it: at _no_ point in time I want to ever hear that again.”

“Tough crowd,” Crowley grumbled before he turned back to Hastur and simply said: “Scram.”

“Wh…what?”

“Scram,” Crowley repeated. “Leave. Scoot. Fuck off. Skedaddle. Whatever you wish to call it. I’m sure as soon as your little friends wake up, they’ll follow you”

Hastur with effort got back to his feet and took a few steps back.

“You’re an idiot, Crowley, if you think I’ll forgive you because you spared my life,” he growled while the ground beneath him opened, slowly pulling him down.

Crowley’s expression was surprisingly void of any triumph or mockery. Earnestly he looked at Hastur who stared at him with pure hatred.

“I stand by what I said. I had no choice,” Crowley said calmly. “But for what’s it worth: I’m sorry.”

For a second the contempt on Hastur’s face was replaced with disbelief. And then he was gone.

With a loud breath of relief Newt let himself fall down. He did not even care about the ice cold snow slowly soaking the fabric at his butt. Almost being killed by demons really put little discomforts into perspective. He watched as Crowley checked whether the other demons were still unconscious while he himself caught his breath.

“Why am I on an icy demon-infested island and Anathema gets a trip to Eden with an angel?” he grumbled as he got back to his feet after a while.

Crowley’s head snapped up.

“What did you say?” he asked in a low voice.

That was when Newt remembered the second part of Anathema’s message.

Right. _Don’t tell Crowley._


	6. Chapter 6

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Crowley growled.

“Because Anathema told me not to.”

“Not a good reason!” Crowley had started to rummage through one of the unconscious demon’s pockets.

“They went to paradise, Crowley,” Newt tried to calm the other man down. “What could happen?”

“Just in case you haven’t noticed, nerd boy,” Crowley snapped at him. “Not everything in the stories told to you is true. There is danger everywhere. And visiting an ancient place touched by Heaven _and_ Hell is always risky.”

“You mean like the place you and I are literally visiting at this very moment?”

“Completely different thing!”

“Oh really? Aziraphale went on a journey to a dangerous place with a friend without telling you. Seems pretty much like what you did,” Newt shrugged and grinned: “With the difference that you and I aren’t friends but just fellow members of ‘Team Armageddon’t’.”

Humor did not seem to help at the moment.

Crowley gave him a dark look and started to pat the demon’s jacket.

“We’re talking about Aziraphale,” he said. “It’s not his fault, but he is too kind, too trusting and a fucking trouble magnet. You have no idea how often I saved his butt and… now I’m not there and who knows what… whatever. Let me work here.”

Newt would normally be afraid of the mad demon, but seeing the concern, no, the panic lying underneath the angry façade had him sympathize with him. He remembered vividly how he had felt when the vision of Agnes Nutter had told him that Anathema had maneuvered herself into mortal danger. And Crowley had once thought he had lost Aziraphale for good which explained a certain amount of overprotectiveness.

“Here we go,” Crowley muttered and pulled a red glowing key-shaped object from the demon’s inner pocket.

“What’s that?”

“Infernal Journey Key,” Crowley explained. “On Earth are several, hmmm, ‘hot spots’. With these keys as well as their Heavenly counterparts one can travel to Hell – or Heaven – without using the main portals. Mine was confiscated.”

“That’s how they did it,” Newt pointed at the ground that now lay undisturbed but had cracked open a few minutes ago for the demons.

“Yupp,” Crowley nodded. “And this fellow here” he pointed at the man he had taken the key from “will have to hope his comrades give him a ride or find another way.”

“Erm, why?”

“Well, I don’t have time to wait until my powers regenerate and then fly all the way to Eden to save Aziraphale,” Crowley answered. “So we’ll take the short cut.”

*

The smell of peonies filled her nostrils and when finally she could see clearly, she spotted several of them, some white, some pink. But she could feel that the pretty flowers were not what she was here for. Her eyes fell on a large but simple grey rock right in front of the bushes. On first glance there was nothing special about it, except that it looked extremely out of place in its colorless plainness between the green, white and pink surrounding it.

Curiously she stretched out her hand to touch the stone, but paused when she heard someone calling her name. She turned towards the voice and noticed that the environment around her started to blur before her eyes and faded away. Quickly she looked at the rock again, but before she could reach it, it disappeared.

With a gasp Anathema snapped out of her vision.

“Let me go!” she heard Aziraphale’s voice. “You stubborn vine, I will not… ouch!”

As fast as the dizzy feeling in her head allowed she sat up and saw Aziraphale. His upper body stuck out of the plant trap and he was struggling and pulling at the vines attempting to break completely free. The green tendrils still had a firm hold on his legs and were already slinging around his arms again to draw him back.

“You will let me check on my friend or you will regret it!” he said determined.

Anathema let her eyes flick around the area. There! She spotted the shards of her glass bottle and ran. She grabbed two large ones, bolted towards Aziraphale and cut through a vine that was grabbing his right arm. Then she pressed the second shard in his hand and together they worked on freeing all his limbs. Something had weakened the plants and they were visibly slower than before so that she could cut them faster than they could return. With his upper body completely free, Aziraphale was able to move enough to cut in to one of the vines that held his legs and then wiggle further out of the aggressive wickerwork. Now Anathema could reach his legs, too, and together they could cut the rest of Aziraphale’s body free.

They ran towards the clearing with the apple tree. All nearby plants stretched their vines, twigs and roots out for Aziraphale, but the angel pulled Anathema close and held his hand up. A silver white orb suddenly surrounded them, the attacking plants bouncing off – for now. Anathema could feel the divine magic and she also felt it being absorbed with every hit.

“What happened?” she asked, instinctively flinching away from the attacking plants, even though they could not reach them at the moment. “You somehow weakened them. Can you do it again?”

“Oh, I’m not sure,” Aziraphale said. “I heard you groan and you did not answer when I wanted to know if you are alright. They wouldn’t let me check on you and so I got a bit angry. On instinct I performed a couple of miracles to free myself. But they were filled with my anger. Rather unangelic, I know. But still the plants absorbed it while absorbing the miracles.”

“So those things caught you, restrained you and held you prisoner,” Anathema recounted. “But you got angry when they did not let you check on me?”

“Yes.” Aziraphale nodded, obviously not understanding her confusion. “Anyway, what happened? Are you alright?”

“I had a vision,” she explained. “It happens sometimes. I’m not very good at dealing with them, physically.”

“What did you see?”

“A rock. I know, not very interesting. But it was the center of my vision. I feel I need to go there and… do something.”

“Was it here somewhere?”

“I think so,” Anathema nodded. “It looked like Eden, just the rock did not really fit.”

“What else did you see?”

“A meadow with pink and white peonies,” she answered. “Very pretty.”

“Hmmm, there is only one meadow surrounded by peonies,” Aziraphale said thoughtfully. “We passed by it. It’s over there.”

Aziraphale pointed at an areal not far from their current position. Looking closer, Anathema indeed spotted several peony bushes, but they were larger and the space between them was completely overgrown, making it appear completely different from the place in her vision.

“It… could be the place,” she said carefully. “If I saw a past version. Maybe we should…”

All of a sudden several branches, bushes, flowers and vines came rushing towards their protective bubble. Aziraphale’s eyes widened and with a forceful shove he pushed Anathema out of the shield’s range. With a surprised yelp she landed on the soft grass once more. The flora was not interested in her and Aziraphale knew that, too. Of course he had pushed her out of harm’s way. The attackers reached the shield and it was too much. The silver white field flickered once and disappeared. Anathema could only watch as Aziraphale was dragged away again.

*

He was going to Hell! Literally. The crazy demon had activated the key, grabbed Newt and let them both be pulled down.

Now Crowley was pressing his hand against Newt’s mouth to muffle his screams.

“It’s just the living quarters of the demons and the administration area,“ he said soothingly. “You won’t fall into lava, Sulphur or anything like that and you won’t die, okay? But if they notice us, that might be a different story, alright?”

Left without a choice, Newt nodded, fell silent and closed his eyes. After a while Crowley nudged him. With a sigh Newt accepted his fate and started looking. He noticed that he as well as Crowley were in his usual clothes again, the winter dress gone.

They had arrived in a in grey room, illuminated by a weak stale light that left most of the room in darkness. Newt assumed these were the quarters of the demon they took the key from. Barely he made out the outlines of a simple and narrow bed as well as small desk. Next to the exit stood a closet Crowley immediately ripped open.

“Perfect,” he mumbled as he pulled out a dark leather coat and a windbreaker, both with hoods.

“I hope demons shower regularly,” Newt said, eyeing the windbreaker thrown at him suspiciously.

“Depends on the demon.” Crowley had put on the coat and now tried to hide the staff under it.

“Great,” Newt said, wrinkling his nose.

“Look, I’ll miracle you clean when we’re out of here,” Crowley sighed while he pulled the hood deep into his face. “My powers are back. Home sweet home. But let’s not risk any attention as long as we’re under the nose of my former bosses, okay?”

“Sounds smart,” Newt nodded and also hid his face under his hood.

The door squeaked pitifully when Crowley opened it and at first Newt thought that would be the end to their stealth tactic. But when they stepped out of the room, he was relieved and shocked at once.

Relieved because he suddenly knew that nobody would mind them. Two miserable looking figures in dirty clothes, one of them apparently hiding something under their coat would really not strike anyone as odd here.

Shocked because Hell was worse than Newt had thought. Not scarier. Not more painful. But way more depressing. The hallway was broad but still one could not walk it without brushing against someone’s arm or shoulder. It was packed with dark figures that with blank, angry or pained face walked aimlessly around. Newt could not tell if all those creatures were miserable because they were in Hell or if Hell was such a miserable place because it was full of creatures like that. And according to Crowley this was the best area, well, least bad area.

For a while he followed Crowley through random corridors. Bit by bit the hallways they walked became less frequented, but Crowley’s confident posture and purposeful walk kept everyone from questioning them. But then the demon halted and gestured Newt to do the same. He waved him towards a smaller passage and pulled him through. They steered towards a red door and Crowley pushed it open.

The room behind it was apparently an archive. Shelves full with books, files and scrolls climbed along the wall up to the high ceiling and filled the room, leaving only little room to walk between them. In front of one shelf stood the lithe figure of a woman with long strawberry blonde hair. She was studying a scroll and looked up when Newt and Crowley entered. Crowley just greeted with a nod. Newt copied his move and they tried to walk through the room to get to the second exit.

“Crowley?” the woman said.

Cursing Crowley halted. He pushed back his hood and drew his weapon.

“How?” he snarled at the woman.

“I’d recognize these stupid snake boots anywhere,” she sighed. “Make you look exactly like the stupid showoff you are.”

“Listen, Dagon,” Crowley said lowly. “Aziraphale needs me and I will go through that door to reach the old passage. We can either fight - but I bet Hastur already told you about my new weapon…”

“In a lot of colorful words,” she nodded

“…and I have a member of the Witchfinder Army with me...”

“The Witchfinder Army?” Dagon repeated. “Never heard of it.”

“We are a _secret_ army,” Newt explained and added more confident than he felt: “And don’t be fooled by the name. We are trained in fighting supernatural creatures of all kind.”

“Uh uh,” Dagon said. “Or?”

“What?” Crowley asked

Dagon rolled her eyes. “Well you said ‘we can _either_ fight’ and even you should know that this needs an ‘or’ to make sense.”

“Right,” Crowley nodded. “Or my friend and I go to this door,” he pointed at the second exit, “while you run into the other direction, informing the guards.”

“Works for me,” she shrugged.

“Listen, you really sh… what?”

“Works for me,” she repeated. “I have no interest in getting killed to keep you away from a blocked passage.”

“What?”

“One has to repeat oneself often when talking to you, hmm?” she mocked. “Did you think they’d just leave it open?”

“I… I’ll think of something.”

“Think fast,” she said. “I won’t dally around.”

She put away the scroll she had been holding and with her head held high walked towards the door. Crowley grabbed Newt’s arm and pulled him to the second exit.

*

Anathema took a deep breath. She could not panic now. The vines had captured Aziraphale again and the only clue she had was her vision. They were seldom pleasant but always helpful. The faith in the gift she had inherited fueled her as she focused on the scrub that covered the meadow between the peonies. It was admittedly harder to control the wide field of plants than several blades of grass, but it really seemed that the garden was so focused on Aziraphale that almost all power it had was used to keep and guard him.

So when she had found an entry point to the plants’ roots, it took her little effort to move them. The plants all shot up in the air and then fell sidewards, revealing the center of the meadow. And there it was: the large dark rock she had seen in her vision.

She rushed towards it and inspected it from all sides. She saw nothing special about it and so she tried to move it to study the underside. But it did not budge.

She cursed under her breath. It was too heavy for her alone and Aziraphale was not available to help.

Still she would not give up. Crossed-legged she sat down in the soft grass beside the rock and closed her eyes. Maybe meditating close to the stone would reveal its secrets.

*

Crowley dragged Newt through a dimly lit passage that seemed very different from the rest of Hell he had seen. It was not a stale hallway but a tunnel carved into dark stone and, if Newt was not mistaken, with an upward slope. It became narrower with every step until finally they could no longer walk side by side. The path came to an end under a hole in the ceiling. Something was covering it from above and Crowley cursed as he reached for it.

“Stupid runes,” he growled. “I cannot touch it.”

“Let me try?”

“No offense,” Crowley said. “But that looks solid. A single human might…”

“Any better ideas?”

“Not really.”

Crowley sighed. Awkwardly the two men switched positions in the tight space. Then Newt pushed against the object covering the hole. It was stone, a heavy boulder that he could not move alone. But Crowley was unable to touch it.

In the distant echoed a thrashing sound. Someone had pushed the door to the tunnel open. They were running out of time.

*

Impatience had always been a weakness of hers, she knew that. Not always did it cause problems aside from irritating people. Meditation however was something that required a lot of patience. And Anathema did not have much of it to begin with and now with Aziraphale in need and herself out of options, she had trouble focusing on her breathing and inner balance.

So it did not take much to rip her out of the fragile trance she was in. The little sound of movement on the grass was enough. Her eyes snapped open and she looked around. Nobody was in sight, but still she got to her feet to be prepared. She let her gaze wander, but still it seemed like she was alone. When she heard the noise again, she turned back immediately and saw that the rock was moving. Not much, but it wobbled from side to side, enough to be sure.

Carefully she sneaked closer, but one especially wide move of the stone had her stumble back in shock. She could not be certain, but for a second she thought she saw an opening under the rock. She was about to run and command the plants back to cover and secure the rock when she heard two voices. Both very familiar.

“Hurry up, nerd boy, they’re coming.”

“I can hear that. Doesn’t change that this thing is heavy.”

“You mean like I told you?”

“It’s not that there are many altern…”

“Newt? Crowley?” Anathema called out, falling to her knees in front of the rock.

“Anathema?”

“What are you doing down there?”

“Long story. But no time. We need to get out of here, but I cannot move the stone and unfortunately it’s demon-proof so Crowley can’t help.”

Without hesitation Anathema put her hands against the rock.

“On three!” she said.

*

“…three!” sounded Anathema’s voice from above.

His girlfriend’s determination, decisiveness and confidence was exactly what Newt needed. Knowing that she was on the other side of that stone, fueled him with enough willpower to push against the stone with all his strength again. This time it moved. Light fell through the hole and he spotted two elegant small hands with slender fingers pushing against the stone from the side. Frowning he noticed scratches and bruises on them as well as on the wrists peeking out under the clothes.

But that was something to be discussed later. As soon as the opening was completely free, Crowley hissed at him.

“Hurry up, nerd boy,” he said, grabbed Newt by the waist again and basically threw the squealing witchfinder out into the open.

Anathema grabbed his arms and helped him out. The staff landed beside him in the grass and soon Crowley pulled himself up and scrambled out of the hole.

“Put it back, put it back!” the demon yelled at the two humans.

From down below several angry voices sounded, steps of countless feet echoed, coming closer and closer. Newt and Anathema rushed to the stone and pushed it back. When the rock rolled back to its former place, Newt saw a pale hand reach out and pull away from the stone at the last second.

“Your dumb luck won’t last forever, traitor!” sounded the muffled and angry voice of Duke Hastur from below.

Crowley ignored his shouting.

“We should secure this rock more,” he said.

“It was overgrown before I found it,” Anathema said. “I magically moved the plants. I can…”

“Yes… move them back.”

The three of them left the meadow and Anathema stared at the plants. She then lifted her hands and with a wave of her, the vines and thorns around slithered over the grass, covered the meadow and the rock.

“Can’t the other demons just… I don’t know…,” Newt stuttered. “…dig another hole that is not covered by an anti-demon rock?”

“No.” Crowley shook his head. “Digging that tunnel through the ground under Eden took us seven days and the help of Satan himself. Even if they get him to do that again, I do not plan on being here for so long.”

A bit relieved Newt nodded.

Crowley looked around, searching.

“Alright, book girl,” he said. “Where’s Aziraphale?”

Anathema swallowed hard.

“Yes, about that…”


	7. Chapter 7

Very fast Newt had positioned himself between Anathema and Crowley. Not that Anathema was very scared of Crowley, but she was touched by the gesture nonetheless.

“Look, Crowley,” Newt said. “Do you think Anathema could have stopped Aziraphale from coming here if he had set his mind on coming here?”

Crowley frowned, taking his narrowed snake eyes from Anathema and aiming their uncanny stare at Newt.

“Guess not,” he grumbled.

“See! But because she went with him, I knew and that’s why you know,” Newt now turned to Anathema, “sorry for that by the way, honey, it just slipped.”

Anathema smiled.

“Don’t apologize,” she said softly. “Demonic back-up is what I really need. And witchfinding back-up, of course.”

She enjoyed the loving smile that this earned her until Crowley grabbed her face and forced her to look at him.

“Everything you know. Now!” he growled.

Anathema nodded. Crowley had a point. They had to get Aziraphale out of there.

“Okay, so the plants grabbed him,” she explained. “The garden means him no harm. It just doesn’t want him to leave. It revels in his Divinity. The plants even absorb his miracles when he tries to free himself.”

“Weaknesses?”

“Sort of…,” Anathema said. “They regrow faster than one can cut or rip them, usually. Aziraphale managed to weaken them when he got angry. Somehow his anger was in his miracles. Absorbing those miracles had a negative effect on them. They were less strong and slower for a while.”

“Oh, they want anger to let Aziraphale go?” Crowley snarled. “They can have that!”

Without further ado he stalked over to the apple tree clearing, Newt and Anathema close behind him. Of course he immediately spotted the entangled vines between the group of nearby trees.

“Angel?”

“Oh good Lord, Crowley!” Aziraphale’s voice sounded, tone somewhere between happy and concerned. “How did you get past the walls? Are you hurt?”

“I’m not the problem child here, Aziraphale,” Crowley said irritated. “You’re the one who got himself wrapped up in semi-conscious plants.”

“I can’t argue that, I suppose,” sighed Aziraphale.

At that Crowley mumbled something under his breath that Anathema could not quite catch.

“I’ll get you out of there,” he said aloud.

“I would appreciate that, dear.”

A ball of fire appeared in Crowley’s hand and he was about to throw it at the vines when Aziraphale’s voice sounded again.

“Oh, but no fire please, dear,” he said. “I know their behavior is rather rude, but it’s really not their fault. The poor things have been abandoned for so long.”

Crowley rolled his eyes and groaned, but the flame dancing along his long fingers disappeared.

“Alright,” he sighed. “Angry miracle _without_ fire.”

Positioning himself in front of the vines in a straight posture, Crowley dropped his staff and stared at the nest of greenery. He remained like that for a few seconds before finally lifting both his arms.

Anathema’s eyes widened as the shadow Crowley’s body was throwing on the grass started to change its form. The man-shaped shade first turned into an undefined dark mass, then split into several solid black tendrils. They detached themselves from the ground and shot out towards the vegetation that had caught Aziraphale like the tentacles of an angry sea monster. They slung around the green vines but instead off pulling or ripping, their black form became vaporous again and seeped into the plants.

Crowley’s arms fell to his sides and he gasped as he stumbled a little. Using his powers in this place could not be easy for him. Anathema and Newt hurried to his side to support him.

All three of them stared at the plant nest now. At first nothing happened and Anathema started to fear that whatever Crowley had done, had failed. But then the green tendrils started to quiver. Lightly at first, but more and more with every moment until they were shaking. Their grip loosened and uncoordinatedly they separated from each other, disentangling, dissolving the nest. They whipped around and writhed as if in pain and in the middle of the wildly thrashing vines sat a confused angel, trying to find an exit point.

Quickly Crowley freed himself from the humans’ steadying grip, grabbed his staff and ran towards Aziraphale. The vines were not acting purposefully right now and were visibly slowed down. It was similar to the effect Aziraphale’s anger had had on them, just about 10 times worse.

With one fluid motion Crowley knocked aside two thick tendrils, creating an opening for long enough for Aziraphale to crawl out of his green prison. Crowley helped the angel to his feet and dragged him away.

Anathema expected other parts of the garden to attack them now, but whatever Crowley had done seemed to affect the whole of Eden. Every plant and animal seemed to be in motion, but very slow.

“This won’t last forever,” Crowley spoke aloud what she thought while pressing Aziraphale tight against his body. “We need a plan.”

“Anathema, dear,” Aziraphale addressed her. “As far as I know there is a spell witches use to hide their magical signature from detection. Is this correct?”

“Yes, that’s true,” Anathema nodded. “It was one of the first my mother taught me.”

“So you are good and fast at casting it?”

“Yes?”

“Can you vary the spell so that it hides _my_ signature?”

“I don’t know,” Anathema said hesitantly. She had never tried veiling Divine power since it never had been necessary. But it was not completely crazy and whatever better ideas there might have been, she did not have them.

*

Newt watched as Anathema put her hand on Aziraphale’s chest and closed her eyes. Like most of her spells she cast that one silently, but as always moved her lips. Despite the situation Newt could not help but smile a little as he saw it. When she removed her hand a green veil surrounded Aziraphale for a moment. It disappeared quickly, but Anathema nodded so apparently this was normal. But then she frowned.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I cannot completely hide your signature. It’s too much for Earthly magic. I can… dim it, so to speak, but I can still feel it.”

Any hope that unlike Anathema the garden could no longer sense Aziraphale’s Divinity soon was crushed as Newt turned around. It was an uncanny picture. All the different kinds of vegetation as well as several birds and mammals moving through the garden, aiming for Aziraphale. Anathema’s spell had not convinced them that their target was gone. Still slowed down by Crowley’s demonic miracles, but nonetheless determined, they slithered and sneaked closer and closer.

Newt let his eyes flick over the place in hopes that something would give him an idea. Finally his gaze fell on the staff in Crowley’s hand.

“Honey,” he said to Anathema. “You said you dimmed Aziraphale’s signature, right?”

She nodded.

“So it is like a weak light,” he continued. “What if…” he looked pointedly at Crowley, “there was a beacon nearby?”

Crowley’s eyes widened.

“Something that shines very bright and makes them forget the tiny light they are currently hunting,” he said thoughtfully. “Good thinking, Newt.”

Newt noticed how weakened Crowley felt. Still the demon swung the staff over his head in one powerful motion, and rammed it into the ground, causing a chain reaction. The sudden collision had the weapon release a surge of Divine power which immediately made all living things in the garden hold. For a moment nothing moved, then everything rushed towards the staff, the vines, bushes and lianas slinging themselves around it. This in turn caused the staff to protest against its renewed imprisonment by releasing even more of its power and letting it seep into the environment like it had done on Small Wolf Island. But here even Newt could feel it. Maybe it was because here was no Hellish power to balance it out and stop it at some point. Maybe it was the force of Crowley’s willpower behind it. Or maybe something Newt did not understand.

But it was working. The garden was no longer interested in Aziraphale. Part of the flora wrapped up the wooden staff while the other creatures of Eden returned to whatever they were normally doing.

*

Of course Anathema had suspected that the staff Crowley was carrying was not a common one. But now that she felt its full power unravel, she gasped at the sensation. The weapon was mighty, there was no doubt about it. And it was… scandalized?

Yes. Anathema felt a huge wave of indignation radiating from the staff as the plants started to grab it. Pure Divine power flowed out of it, as if calling for Heavenly reinforcement. But the call did not get very far because the garden was too fast in absorbing the energy the staff used.

Then, after a while, the outrage emanating from the weapon faded, being replaced with a mixture of curiosity, sympathy and love.

The staff no longer fought the garden. It no longer demanded to be released. It no longer called for help. Its energy flow became softer, friendlier and controlled. The weapon had submitted to the garden at first, to command it now.

Every animal returned to whatever it had been doing before. All the plants that had slithered around to hunt Aziraphale grew back into their position. The staff itself remained unbothered by anyone or anything, stuck in the ground right in front of the Tree of Knowledge, its power running through the garden and back in a harmonic circle.

And Eden stopped grieving.

Aziraphale apparently could feel it, too. Smiling he unfolded his wings and breathed in the air that was almost the same as before but not entirely.

“Oh, dearest,” he said to Crowley. “Are you quite alright? All this can’t feel too pleasant for you.”

“’Tis not that bad,” Crowley shrugged with his arms crossed. “It’s… good to see the garden restored fully. ‘Tis a nice place after all. Just wonder how I’m gonna get out of here with the walls all demon-proof.”

But when they returned to the stairs that led up the wall, there was a hole in the solid stonework, just the right size for a person to pass through. They all, including Crowley, could climb out without any problem.

After the last of them had left the garden, they turned around, only to look at a vast sea of sand under the desert sun.

“A pity that such a beautiful place is hidden from the world,” Aziraphale sighed.

“Well, angel,” Crowley grinned. “If it would not hide from the world, you’d soon have adventurers climbing the rocks, teenagers snogging under the trees and toddlers peeing in the lake. Not to forget the Starbucks at each cardinal point.”

Aziraphale shuddered at that and allowed Crowley to drag him away.

“Now, dove, about your little adventure here…” the demon said sternly while walking towards the sinking sun.

Anathema and Newt looked at each other, shrugged and followed the angel and the demon.

*

Back in Jasemin Cottage Newt carefully put the letter into a drawer and closed the lid. He had never thought that words by Agnes Nutter would mean so much to him, but here he was.

“Well, I certainly didn’t expect that,” Anathema’s voice sounded.

Newt turned towards the door where she leant against the frame with a smile.

“What exactly?”

“You to treat this letter so respectfully,” she said. “I half-expected you to burn it.”

Newt scoffed good-naturedly.

“What good would that have done?” he teased. “Last time we burnt something she wrote, she came back from the dead to make sure we were well informed.”

Anathema smirked and put her arms around Newt’s neck.

“You have point there,” she admitted with a chuckle. But then she turned serious. “Are you alright? Crowley didn’t say much but apparently you fought a giant wolf?”

Now it was Newt’s turn to laugh.

“Close enough,” he said. “But let me tell you everything tomorrow, okay?”

“First I need to know that you are alright,” she insisted.

“I am,” he promised. “But I have to digest everything that happened on the island before I can explain it.”

“Can you at least tell me what Agnes’ letter said?” she asked, looking up at him with a pout, her big brown eyes pleading with him.

“Let’s say, it did make me feel less like a failure.”

Now Anathema frowned.

“You felt like a failure before?”

“Of course,” Newt scoffed. “How could I not?”

“Well, you’re not!”

“My whole life I could not keep a single job,” he said.

“That’s why you became a witchfinder,” she gave back. “And that brought you to me.”

“Until recently I broke every computer I touched.”

“That’s how you saved the world.”

“I couldn’t even keep a secret from Crowley.”

“Which saved Aziraphale and me.”

“Half an hour ago I broke the blue vase.”

“And when I carried the shards to the trash I found the poor hedgehog stuck in the fence.”

“I spilled coffee over your tarot deck last week.”

“I met several new customers for readings when I bought a new one.”

“I…”

Her finger was on his mouth all of a sudden and there was a fire in her eyes that was scary and beautiful.

“If you don’t stop badmouthing my boyfriend I will turn you into a frog,” she said hotly.

For a moment there was silence.

“Marry me!” he blurted out before he could stop himself.

Openmouthed she stared at him.

“Damn it, sorry, that slipped,” he stuttered. “That’s not how I was planning to go about it. Not that I planned anything yet, but right now I don’t even have a ring and…”

The rest of his rambling faded into the kiss she pressed on his lips.

“No take-backs,” she whispered. “You’re not getting out of this.”

“Woe me,” he smiled before kissing her again.


	8. Epilogue

When Crowley opened his eyes, the moon’s light fell through the window from a starry night sky. The sun would not rise for another three or four hours and yet the mattress next to his was empty.

Growling the demon threw back his blanket and got up. Stark naked he prowled through the small flat above the bookshop, the old wood creaking beneath his bare feet. Silently he made his way down the stairs and entered the quiet bookshop. It was dark, except for the warm orange light glowing in Aziraphale’s back room.

There he sat: Aziraphale. In a ridiculous yet endearing old-fashioned nightgown, the blond curls slightly disheveled, the useless but adorable glasses on the nose and said nose deep in an old tome while several other books piled up on the floor and desk beside him. Now and again he would look up, take notes and mumble something unintelligible.

Crowley shook his head and smiled. He had told the stubborn creature to rest at least a day before doing anything else, without leaving any wiggle room. Then again, it was close to impossible to word any demand in a way that Aziraphale would find no wiggle room. But seeing Aziraphale so engrossed in his beloved books, Crowley was unable to be mad at him.

Still he put on a stern face as he sauntered into the back room.

“Hey, angel,” he said darkly and had to fight a grin when Aziraphale’s head snapped up and a sheepish expression spread on his face.

“Oh, hello, dearest,” he said. “Erm, I know what you said, but you see, you didn’t specify what exactly you meant with ‘rest’ and our ten hour flight to London wasn’t exactly eventful. Plus we crossed a timezone and now it’s after midnight so technically…”

Crowley shut him up with a kiss.

“Alright, angel,” he smiled. “I’m sure whatever I say now, you’d have a convincing counterargument.”

At that Aziraphale blushed a little, but notably did not object.

“So, any news?” Crowley asked and pointed at the scroll Aziraphale had found in Eden.

“Except for the naked demon in my study?”

“Yes, besides that,” Crowley smirked. “Got God’s new number yet?”

Suddenly Aziraphale’s features took on a serious expression as he shook his head.

“I may have misinterpreted Agnes Nutter’s words,” he admitted. “I thought ‘what was lost’ referred to something I lost. A rather selfish interpretation I know. I just miss Her.”

“Hey, that’s understandable, dove.” Crowley knelt beside Aziraphale and kissed his forehead. “And I misinterpreted my letter, too. I needed the staff to protect what I protected before, but it wasn’t Earth, it was you.”

Softly Aziraphale smiled and leant into the touch of the hand that now tenderly cupped his cheek. But there was regret in his eyes.

“I’m sorry that you had to give up the staff for me,” he said quietly.

“Are you kidding me?” Crowley grinned. “A piece of old wood against the most beautiful creature in the universe? The stupid garden made a bad deal there.”

“Well,” Aziraphale answered with a blush. “But it’s not just any old piece of wood, is it? It’s the staff of the Archangel Raphael.”

“I’m sure he would agree with me,” Crowley said. “He was an arrogant bastard, but not an idiot.”

“I don’t…”

Any further objection Aziraphale could have made were stopped with another kiss and before he could find new arguments, Crowley changed the topic back to the scroll.

“So, this doesn’t help you to find God?” he asked.

“No,” Aziraphale said. “At first I thought it was a ritual to maybe call Her or locate Her, but it is a ritual to lift curses.”

“Lifting curses?” Crowley rose an eyebrow. “I’m sure Anathema and hundreds of other witches can do that, too.”

Again Aziraphale shook his head.

“This is way more powerful than witchcraft, Crowley,” he said. “It lifts a very specific powerful curse – if I can find everything I need that is.”

“Which specific curse?” Crowley wanted to know.

Aziraphale hesitated.

“I just started translating and will have to verify…”

“Which curse, angel?”

Aziraphale’s deep blue eyes met Crowley’s.

“The ‘Fading’.”

The End

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a short epilogue so you guys know that all this stress our beloved heroes went through wasn't for naught. ;)  
> Leave me a kudo, let me know what you think in the comments or find me on tumblr: https://unproblematicme.tumblr.com/
> 
> Thank you for reading! <3


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